Truth

I learned about truth the way many of us did. "These truths" were self-evident in The United States of America's founding document, the Declaration of Independence. I knew nothing about lies, having never lied, I also had not been accused of lying, so I know it is so. Because I had never known what they were, I didn't even know that they are the opposite of truth. I grew up a theater child and had heard tell of "suspension of disbelief", however, there was little discussion about the fact that everything we create in theater is a lie. From the sets to the props, from the teasers to the tormentors, it all exists to trick the audience into believing  our story. Even autobiographical theater is a story of who the author wants the audience to think they are. It was perhaps too self-reflective to speak of the lying nature of our business back then, but it must be understood to get to the bottom of what truth is. The idea of willful ignorance, the root of stupidity itself, is based on this willingness to continue to believe in lies in spite of mounting evidence to the contrary.

I will attempt to write about truth when even the act of writing is a lie. All stories are imperfect reflections through a kaleidoscope of words that depend on you defining what is meant by each of them and, if you are paying attention, to make decisions about what they meant in total. A stone, even well described, is not the same stone for you as it is for me and certainly the essential quality that the speaker has in mind cannot be conveyed in five letters. That is why geologists have so many names for them. Even describing something real in exacting terms cannot be the thing, so it is a representation, a figmentary non-rock which exists only in it's description. So too, the essence of truth is obscured by words. My attempt, as writer, is to lie to you in such a way as to simulate truth and hope that by reflection, in my very dirty mirror, and your astute mind, through presenting a variety of vagaries, can decipher the essence of it. I can make models of what it is not, perhaps fill in the negative space, but to show you truth, standing alone can only be done through examples pulled out of our collected experience, hoping you will "get" my meaning in spite of the allusions and props used to mimic the reality and it's essence  I want to define or point to what I believe is truth. My reality, my version by the way, cloaked in your perceptions. In trying to do it succinctly, I have to contort words to get my points across, so beware of putting too much meaning on any one point that I am about to make, taken together these paragraphs are but a shot in the dark, toward an essential quality that defies description.

We were told that when nuclear energy was implemented, electricity would be "too cheap to meter", that was a lie. The truth was, some scientists wanted the waste from nuclear energy production to make bombs, terrible bombs, which could destroy the world many times over. These self same scientists didn't care how many billions of BTUs of fossil energy would need to be squandered to achieve their aims. They only sought "success" as their "truth" allowed them to define it. As it turns out, the whole process, from inception had been a horrible waste of human effort. The lie carried far more weight than the truth in the American psyche, but the burden of millions of years of contamination will be born by our species in perpetuity. Truth was deemed too harsh for the American people, so lies carried the day. For some, they still do.The extortion and raping of our economy by the military industrial complex is still, seemingly, too distasteful to discuss openly, so we continue to fabricate lies about how our "security" is "enhanced" by blowing up foreign air bases and cave complexes built by our CIA, in prior times, to help further undermining prior regimes. That, sadly, seems to be the way the cookie crumbles. Eisenhower himself pointed out that even the President cannot bring these lying, cheating death merchants to heel. But again, how does this convey the essence of truth? Sorrowfully, only by it's opposition to it. Truth, however is even more than what these lies are not.

So, how am I, or when will I be getting to writing about truth? Well, it is time to speak truth to power and I will not be letting down my attempt to show you at least one truth before ending my post. It requires generosity (a form of hospitality), courage, discipline and perseverance. Truth is often self-less, given from the heart and researched through a lifetime of fidelity to fact, the ability to be self-reliant and not be parasitic to any other person. This is a hard one because so many are willing to sell themselves or profit from the efforts of others. Making things, especially when you constantly work to improve your craftsmanship, efficiency or technique, utilize creative problem solving to overcome systemic problems, etc. reflects truth and an attempt to hold it dear. If this description seems somewhat circuitous, it is because truth has many aspects, although it is one thing, a whole. To some this Truth, has the countenance of a deity. It is "holy" as it were. In an effort to approximate truth, a story with an important picture may do well to describe...

ECO-TOURS OF WISCONSIN INC. NORTHEAST WISCONSIN PLANTING SITES- Since this photo was taken, sites have been added, in Manitowoc, Wisconsin and in Chase, Wisconsin. More native plants will flourish there as we continue planting and growing, building community and assisting the native flora and fauna to co-exist in ecological integrity.

Even understanding all the maps, graphs and charts in the world won't help find truth, it is that illusive. This photo shows just one reason why. I have kept track over the years of where ECO-Tours of Wisconsin Inc. has planted trees. To the best of my ability I accurately placed a pin at each planting site. However, the pins themselves, in scale, are nearly mile wide! The plant-ins that have been held at these sites were rarely more than perhaps two hundred feet wide and were never more than a quarter mile wide. Some places were just a single line of trees planted as a screen, hedge or wind break, so even thirty years on, they will only be thirty feet wide at their greatest, not nearly a mile wide as the pin suggests. Just to try to clarify, These locations have had more than 60K trees planted in them and over three million tree seeds as well, however, at this scale, all of those tree seedlings we planted would fit within a single pin hole. (less than 200 acres actually) Even if every tree seed grew to a mature tree, which is impossible, the area covered would be about the size of one of the larger pin heads, (about 9K acres) The map makes our impact seem much larger, because all maps are a lie. They reflect only a tiny selection of "things"  in inappropriate scale, to get only one bit of information across and their information is always, by nature, contaminated by the fact that it is a representation, not the real thing.

Truth needs more champions and lies need to continue to be exposed.